


like an onion, i contain multitudes

by sinnar



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Crack, Crack Logic, Crack Treated Seriously, Dysfunctional Relationships, Gen, Humor, POV Alternating, about 1/2 crack 1/2 'this probably doesnt exactly qualify as crack huh' n 100 percent tomfoolery, author is bobo the fool, cabin fever, contributing to the 'the arcobaleno live in a mansion together' trope one fic at a time!, honestly don't expect anything of substance this fic is pure dumbassery, i wrote this to make myself laugh and it shows
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-17
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2020-09-05 20:30:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20279374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinnar/pseuds/sinnar
Summary: Colonnello falls down a rabbit hole and makes it everyone else's problem.or: five times Colonnello thought Skull was hiding something, and one time he didn't.





	1. 1.00 - 1.50

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i shouldn't be starting another wip and yet.... this idea wouldn't leave me alone, haha. 
> 
> as a warning: this might start out reasonably enough, but it very quickly devolves into just. a whole bunch of tomfoolery. just a great deal of clowning. an absolute bucketload of buffoonery. 
> 
> i wrote this because i had a couple of pretty shitty days and i needed to make myself laugh. (and thus the author revealed the mortifying truth about their sense of humor...) & mostly im posting it rn in the hopes that it might help cheer someone else up, too :) 
> 
> also, although this is, technically speaking, formatted as a 5 + 1 fic (uh. _kinda_), i don't think this really counts bc i did it in sorta a weird way that's probably an abomination & horror & affront to 5 + 1 fics everywhere, haha. you'll see what i mean, i'm sure. otherwise, i hope you enjoy!

1.00

Today, as they did on the fifth of every month, the Arcobaleno gathered themselves together and trooped over to the Giglio Nero mansion to have their meeting with Yuni. ‘Meeting’ being, of course, a relatively poor descriptor - privately, most of the Arcobaleno regarded it in nature as nothing more than a pseudo-social gathering where they were forced to sit in one another’s company for an hour and make strained, vaguely polite conversation while Yuni looked on with a smile. 

Sure, the Arcobaleno might live in the same place - all with extreme reluctance, all with the lamentable awareness that if they wanted to grow up faster, proximity to the other Arcobaleno was, however unfortunately, the only thing that would help - but that didn’t mean that they loitered in one another’s company, or _mingled_, or - god forbid - _enjoyed_ their current living circumstances. 

Yuni, feasibly aware of this, had thus decided to institute the monthly meetings, and the Arcobaleno had agreed to it with a previously hitherto unheard of level of reluctance - but they _had_ agreed, however impossibly it now seemed, looking back. 

“It’s nice to have everyone in one place and getting along, isn’t it?” Yuni had said at some point during one such meeting, many months ago. 

“Um.” Colonnello had said, watching as Lal’s eye began to twitch violently, her grip on her cup tightening to the point where Colonnello heard a distinct, worrying _crack_ as Skull, next to Lal, continued to talk her ear off about _makeup brands_, of all things. Skull seemed perfectly oblivious to the danger he was in, the moron. “...Yes.”

At that point, Colonnello had taken a hasty drink of his coffee, avoiding Yuni’s gaze as, in a moment of brilliant timing, Lal finally lost her temper and raised her cup up, up, _up_ \- and then brought it smashing down on Skull’s head. The glass tinkled as it shattered, the shards tangling themselves in Skull’s hair, the remaining coffee in the cup dripping through the strands, flattening them down as they slowly drizzled their way down his face. Skull let out a loud screech, his arms flailing around as he leaned back in his seat just a tad too far and-- 

Colonnello let out a sigh as Skull’s chair fell backwards, crashing against the ground. Skull followed with it, his screeching becoming incrementally louder as he hit the floor.

Everyone around the table had been eyeing this spectacle with varying degrees of interest - and as such, coincidentally, no one, least of all Colonnello, had been paying attention to the way Yuni’s face turned troubled, her smile faltering, just for a split second. 

No one noticed this, and no one noticed how her face quickly smoothed out, her eyes narrowing in a calculating, far off way - and since no one noticed, no one could wonder _why_. 

Perhaps if they had noticed, and _had_ wondered, they might have been able to predict today - for _this_ meeting promised to be a surprising (slightly unwelcome) break from the dull monotony of poorly faked civility: Byakuran, it seemed, was in attendance. 

The Arcobaleno all protested this - wasn’t this meeting supposed to be just for _them_, after all? What need was there for Byakuran to be anywhere near here? Also, nobody liked him. 

“That’s not very nice,” Byakuran said, and he got several incredulous looks for this. 

“It’s the _truth_,” Skull muttered, hovering cautiously behind Fon. Byakuran tilted his head curiously at that, then smiled at Skull, his eyes crinkling. Skull _eep_-ed and ducked more fully behind Fon. 

“I want him here,” Yuni said, before any of the other Arcobaleno could jump in with more protests. Her eyes were widened beseechingly, her lips trembling _just_ so. “Just for today. He won’t be a disturbance, I promise.”

Distrustful gazes swung over to Byakuran, who smiled wider at them and popped a sugar cube in his mouth. “Promise,” he said, the word slightly garbled around the dissolving cube in his mouth. 

The Arcobaleno exchanged looks, then began to seat themselves around the circular table. A brief scuffle ensued over who would have to suffer through sitting next to Byakuran - Yuni had graciously taken the seat to his left, and somehow, impossibly, Colonnello found himself taking the other, gripping his bleeding ear and hissing, “You _bit_ me, kora!” to Skull. 

“Sorry, senpai,” Skull said, looking entirely unrepentant. Colonnello narrowed his eyes at Skull, already calculating his revenge. 

“Whatever,” he huffed, sullenly picking up the cup of coffee Yuni had poured for him and taking a drink. 

The table fell into silence as everyone sipped their drinks and avoided meeting anyone else’s gaze, pretending to be utterly absorbed with their drinks and the very nicely arranged finger sandwiches and cookies. 

“So,” Yuni said, after the silence had gone on a bit longer than was bearable. Her smile was starting to look strained around the edges. “How has your month been, everyone?”

Though it was currently only midday and the windows in the room were closed and sealed, Colonnello heard crickets. 

At last, Fon cleared his throat and set his cup down on the table with a light _clink_. 

“It’s been well,” Fon said, very tactfully not mentioning the several disasters that naturally occurred when the Arcobaleno were shoved into a living space together. “How have you been, Yuni?”

“Oh, well,” Yuni said, smiling back and relaxing slightly. Colonnello leaned forward as she began to talk, selecting several of the finger sandwiches - which really did look _divine_ this month - and shoving them into his mouth. 

_Technically_ speaking, he was a growing boy - Colonnello was _well_ within his rights. He chewed, swallowed, and then stuck his tongue out at Fon, who looked vaguely horrified by the display, and then leaned back in his chair after snagging and shoveling down a few more. 

Byakuran chose that moment to angle himself towards Colonnello, and Colonnello stiffened, his fingers itching for the comforting weight of his rifle. Byakuran chuckled - Colonnello stiffened further, and leaned away - his eyes focused on some point beyond Colonnello. Colonnello frowned, then followed the direction of Byakuran’s gaze, his eyes settling on Skull. 

“Isn’t it surprising,” Byakuran said, tone low, his voice carrying only to Colonnello’s ears, “how much there is to someone like him?” 

“...I guess,” Colonnello said warily, eyeing Skull as he let out a yelp and jumped in his seat, his cup of coffee dropping out of his hands and onto the ground, the hot liquid splashing over his shoes and the bottom hem of his pants. Skull turned to squawk indignantly at Reborn, who ignored him, a smug smile curling the corners of his mouth as he delicately stirred his own cup and set aside some fruit on his plate for Leon. 

“So much depth,” Byakuran mused. “It’s a wonder how he keeps it concealed, don’t you think?”

Colonnello turned his dubious stare on Byakuran, narrowing his eyes in distrust as he not so subtly attempted to scoot his chair away. “If you say so,” Colonnello said, about five seconds from grabbing his plate and shattering it over Byakuran’s head in - what he was sure would be considered - self defense. What was Byakuran trying to hint at? Was this a threat?

Or… wait.

Could this be Byakuran’s weird way of hitting on Skull… through _Colonnello_…?

Inwardly, Colonnello gagged, his mind shying away from the mental image it had conjured up. 

Byakuran slanted his gaze over to Colonnello, one eyebrow ticking upwards. “Ah,” he said, as though remembering something. “That’s right. _Hm_.”

And with that, Byakuran leaned back and settled himself comfortably in his chair, kindly granting Colonnello his personal space once more. 

Despite himself, Colonnello felt his curiosity flare to life. “What?” he asked, tone decidedly unfriendly. 

“Hm? Oh, don’t worry about it,” Byakuran said dismissively, somehow producing a bag of marshmallows and pulling out a handful. “I just forgot that you didn’t know - well, it doesn’t matter. Forget I said anything.” 

“You--” Colonnello started, with every intent to get to the bottom of _whatever the fuck_ Byakuran was implying, but Yuni chose, at that moment, to turn her attentions on him. 

“Colonnello!” She said, smiling genuinely. “What about your month? How have you been?”

It took a split second for his mind to switch tracks, but Colonnello quickly cleared his throat and drummed his fingers on the table as he began to speak, eyes examining those around the table, trying to discern if anyone else had taken note of the - quite frankly, _bizarre_ \- conversation Byakuran had decided to initiate. 

Unfortunately, it appeared not - Yuni was bouncing quite adeptly between Colonnello and the other six Arcobaleno, fielding and directing their conversations and attention with gentle nudges, while Skull was busy screeching incoherently at Reborn as Reborn’s elbow ‘accidentally’ nudged Skull’s brand new cup off the table.

Colonnello was alone with his horror. 

He darted a glance at Byakuran out of the corner of his eye - Byakuran appeared to be quite content to sip his coffee and munch on his marshmallows, ignoring Colonnello completely, as though nothing had happened. 

Colonnello blinked, then forcibly pushed Byakuran and his peculiar small talk skills - or lack thereof - out of his mind. 

Byakuran was just being his usual creepy, aggravating self - the conversation wasn’t anything more than an attempt to unsettle Colonnello, and he refused to give Byakuran the satisfaction of it _working_.

* * *

The thing was, Colonnello couldn’t stop _thinking_ about it. 

_Hidden depths_, he thought was a scoff, watching as Skull jumped up and down, futilely attempting to grab his mug down from the highest shelf in the kitchen, loudly complaining about whoever had put it there. _Again_.

Colonnello had put it there. 

This time, at least - he was fairly certain that it was an unspoken pact amongst most of the other Arcobaleno: if you saw Skull’s mug, it went on the highest shelf. In this respect, at least, everyone got along. 

It soothed him slightly, seeing Skull’s palpable frustration at being too short to reach it, and too prideful to grab a stool or clamber atop the countertop, let alone - god _forbid_ \- ask for help. 

Byakuran didn’t know what he was talking about. Colonnello knew Skull regrettably well - personality wise, at least - and the lackey wasn’t hiding anything from them. Skull was disastrously, obnoxiously himself, in every sense of the word - he probably didn’t even know the meaning of the word ‘deception’. 

_Yeah_, Colonnello thought, relaxing further into his seat and enjoying his free entertainment. _Hidden depths, indeed_. 

1.50

The thing about being stuck in a mansion with six other people - only about one point five of which you actually _liked_ \- is that it didn’t leave much for you to do. Sure, there was training, and the actual _growing up_ bit (which could be surprisingly painful and time consuming when a growth spurt hit), and there were plenty of books and other media entertainment - but one could only distract themselves with these things for so long before they too, grew stale, and you needed a breath of fresh air to stop you from snapping and going completely barmy. 

All this to say, of course, that Colonnello was _bored_. 

He suspected he wasn’t the only one - the other Arcobaleno had appeared restless lately as well, and it probably wouldn’t be too long until it grew to be too much and everyone began to demand another break so that they could revel in their individual freedoms. Still, until they reached that breaking point, that didn’t solve Colonnello’s current dilemma, which had him awake at three in the morning, restless with energy and unable to sleep, creeping down to the kitchen to see if he could find himself a snack. 

One more time - _growing boy_.

To his surprise, the kitchen was already occupied - Skull sat at the table, clad in a rumpled purple pajama set, his elbows set atop the table, his head propped against his hand as he stared down at his mug contemplatively. The overhead light was turned on to its dimmest setting, casting a circle of light around the table and leaving the rest of the kitchen bathed in shifting shadows. 

Colonnello flicked the other lights on pointedly, and Skull started, only then noticing Colonnello’s presence. _Someone_ needed to work on being aware of their surroundings. 

“Oh, Colonnello-senpai!” Skull said, his eyes flicking around nervously to the several exit points in the kitchen. “I’ll, uh, get out of your way--” the chair scraped against the floor noisily as Skull stood, clutching his mug to his chest, edging away. 

“No,” Colonnello said, feeling surprisingly generous and finding himself willing to tolerate Skull’s company. Once again - _bored_. “Stay, kora.”

Skull hesitantly sat down, still clutching his mug to his chest. His face was surprisingly bare of makeup - Colonnello couldn’t quite remember the last time he had witnessed such an event. He squinted at Skull as he shuffled past, heading for the refrigerator. Were Skull’s eyes abnormally red-rimmed, or was that just his normal face…?

“Were you _crying_?” Colonnello said, opening the fridge and squinting into the depths within. 

Behind him, Skull began to splutter incoherently. 

Colonnello took that as a _yes_, then tuned Skull out and took the time to peruse his options. He _could_ take Reborn’s tiramisu cake - pissing Reborn off was always a fun way to start the morning, and it could provide some decent entertainment… 

Colonnello reached out to take the cake, shut the fridge, grabbed himself a utensil, then settled across from Skull, who was still yammering out excuses that Colonnello wasn’t the least interested in hearing. 

“Yeah, alright,” Colonnello said, putting an end to the charade. “We both know you were crying, lackey. There’s no use pretending, kora.”

“I wasn’t crying!” 

Colonnello stuck a piece of cake in his mouth and chewed, his gaze decidedly unimpressed. Skull deflated, then set his mug down and pushed it around the tabletop with his fingertips, avoiding Colonnello’s stare as a small pout formed on his face. 

“So what were you crying about?” Colonnello asked mercilessly, slowly picking his way through the cake. “Is it the mug thing?”

Skull’s eyebrows bunched together. “The mug thing…?”

“Nevermind,” Colonnello said. If Skull hadn’t caught on yet, Colonnello wasn’t going to be the one to break it to him. “What was it?” Then, “Wait, no - let me guess.” He examined Skull critically, who shifted uncomfortably under the attention, frowning slightly. 

“It’s your baby face,” Colonnello decided. 

Skull spluttered. “I don’t have a baby face!”

“Sure you do,” Colonnello said. “You look like you’re still two, kora.”

Skull scowled. “I do _not_,” he said, voice rising into a nigh unbearable whine. 

“The truth hurts,” Colonnello said, mock sympathetically. “Enough for you to cry about it, even.”

“I wasn’t crying about that!”

“But you admit you _were_ crying?”

Skull looked about five seconds away from attempting to bash his mug over Colonnello’s head. Colonnello raised his eyebrows at him, _daring_ him to try it - and Skull subsided, scowling fiercer than ever, his face flushed with embarrassment. 

They both went quiet, Colonnello content to sit and munch his way through Reborn’s tiramisu cake now that the temptation of taunting Skull had run its course. Skull, for his part, had settled back into his contemplative, withdrawn silence as he drank from his mug, gaze far away.

Minutes passed before Skull broke the silence. “I had a nightmare,” he said, very quietly. Colonnello glanced at him - Skull’s eyes were widened in surprise, as though he hadn’t quite expected those words to slip out, and he peered at Colonnello uncertainly. 

_Oh, great_, Colonnello thought. _Tell a guy he doesn’t have to leave you alone **once** and suddenly you’re his therapist_. 

Still, his curiosity was piqued, and it was three in the morning - Colonnello didn’t have anything better to do. 

“Nightmare?” He prompted. It wasn’t like this was unusual - with everything the Arcobaleno had gone through - the curse, the mafia, the whole shebang that was the Future-That-Wasn’t - well, to put it lightly: they all had their issues. Nightmares probably came a dime a dozen around here. “What about?”

Skull looked surprised again, as though he hadn’t expected this either. 

Fair enough. 

Skull spun his empty mug around between his hands, balancing it on its edge and twisting it around and around with quick fingers. “Nothing much,” he murmured, gaze drifting away, focusing on a point beyond Colonnello. “Just, uh…” Skull paused, chewing on the inside of his cheek. “...What was Byakuran talking to you about?” he asked, abruptly switching tacks. “During the meeting.”

Colonnello’s eyebrows rose as he was temporarily taken aback. “What, you noticed that, kora?”

Skull’s mug spun faster. “Yeah,” he said. “Well - kinda. And Byakuran said something to me, too, when we were leaving, is the thing, and it was kinda, uh…” Skull shuddered. “Unnerving.”

“What’d he say?”

“I asked you first!”

“_And_?” Colonnello pointed his fork at Skull threateningly, and Skull shrank back, raising his hands in the air defensively and letting his mug clatter onto the table, falling on its side and rolling until the handle forced it to a stop.

“Alright!” Skull yelped, and Colonnello went back to Reborn’s cake, satisfied. “It wasn’t much,” Skull continued. “He just… smiled at me, like this-” Skull demonstrated, his nose wrinkling slightly as his lips stretched upwards and his eyes crinkled closed, “-and he said-” and here Skull did an extremely poor, high pitched imitation of Byakuran’s voice, “-’good luck’.”

“Hm,” Colonnello said thoughtfully. “...That’s it?”

Skull’s cheeks puffed out indignantly. “_That’s it_? What’d he tell you then?”

“Nothing much,” Colonnello said dismissively. “Just something he thought might unsettle me.”

“And you’re telling _me_ ‘that’s it’?! Yours is so vague!”

“You’ll understand one day when you’re old enough,” Colonnello said. 

“I’m the same age as you!”

“Physically, sure. But spiritually? We’re leagues apart, kora.”

“Are _not_\--”

Colonnello aimed a kick at Skull under the table, and smiled to himself when his foot connected solidly with Skull’s shin. 

Skull yelped, then scooted backwards and bent down to rub at his leg, casting dark looks at Colonnello and muttering incoherently under his breath. When he straightened up, face screwed up in a way that meant he was planning on being completely, irredeemably obnoxious for the next few minutes, Colonnello sighed. 

“Have some cake,” he said, still feeling unusually gracious and merciful. 

Skull paused, his irritation fading somewhat. “That’s Reborn’s cake,” he said, staring. 

“_And_?”

Skull’s gaze flickered down to the cake, then back up at Colonnello, and after a moment he stood up and fetched himself a fork. Colonnello grinned. 

Between the two of them, Reborn’s cake was swiftly demolished and consumed, and without a word, Skull took their dishes and went to wash and put them away. Colonnello watched him, tapping his fingers on the tabletop as he thought. 

“Hey,” he said. “Your nightmare - you didn’t say what it was about.”

Skull shrugged as he dried and put the last dish - his mug - away. “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “It was a really long time ago. Before I met you guys.”

Colonnello frowned. _Before_ Skull had met the Arcobaleno? What, when he was just a stuntman?

“Thanks for the cake, senpai,” Skull said, slipping over to the doorway, hesitating slightly, his hand lingering on the frame as his shoulders hunched up to rest by his ears. “...and for the company.”

Skull padded away down the hall without waiting for a response. Colonnello watched him go, questions swirling around in his mind. 

_So much depth_, Byakuran had said, his words twisting their way through Colonnello’s mind, entirely unbidden. _Oh, don’t worry about it. I just forgot you didn’t know - well, it doesn’t matter._

A small seed of doubt that had been meticulously planted by capable, careful hands began to unfurl and take root in Colonnello’s mind. 

Perhaps it was the late hour, or the time he had just spent in Skull’s company - hell, maybe it was even the purloined tiramisu cake speaking - but Colonnello couldn’t help wondering… 

How well did he know Skull, really?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my outline for this fic is, once again, just a bunch of jokes. here's one from this chapter:
> 
> colonnello: what if... skull is hiding something... from _us_.... the _arcobaleno_... aha ha, just kidding... there's no way....... **unless**...?
> 
> i'd love to hear y'all's thoughts if you want to share them, however short or long they may be!! thank you very much for giving this fic a chance and reading it!!! 💕


	2. 2.00 - 2.67

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> writing this chapter was like: *puts on my clown makeup**puts on my clown wig**puts on my clown nose**puts on my clown shoes**puts on my clow
> 
> but on a vaguely more serious note: folks, i really am warning you. last chapter was somewhat reasonable. semi-reasonable, one could say. this chapter? it takes a sharp turn into clown town. reasonable-ness has left the station, quite possibly for a long while yet. check in w urselves and ask what you're willing to put up with today. is it this? is it—
> 
> hm. well, now it just sounds like im trying to talk you out of reading this chapter. whoops.

2.00

The next few days showed a marked difference in many of the Arcobaleno’s routines, for three of the following reasons: 

Firstly, as the more observational of the Arcobaleno were puzzled to note, Colonnello seemed entirely occupied with his thoughts, to the point where, quite bizarrely, he seemed to be determined to spend his time going between the library and his bedroom, carting around books and papers, his arms full of office supplies and, most strangely noted, yarn. He appeared to be researching who-knew-what - or, more accurately perhaps, who-really-cared-what - and, bafflingly, was utterly absorbed in the task. This would only, as the rest of Arcobaleno would discover - and the more unfortunate among them would experience, much to their individual horror, distaste, and exasperation - be the beginning of Colonnello’s strange and inexplicable spiral downwards. 

Secondly, Skull had deemed it fit to retreat to the garage to spend quality time with his bike. This in and of itself was not entirely strange nor unusual - Skull had the tendency of being more than a little bit of a gear-head, and he was all too happy to see to the maintenance needs of the various vehicles stashed away in the mansion. What was odd, however, was the time he was recently dedicating to hiding away in the garage, tinkering around with his bike. Hours upon hours upon hours every day, for what was now verging on four days. 

Still, not nearly weird enough for anyone to give it more than a second thought. They all needed space sometimes, even someone as insufferably extroverted as Skull. 

The impression that something might, perhaps, _not_ be perfectly standard occured when Verde poked his head into the garage - not to check on Skull, of course, and certainly not out of any real concern, as Verde didn’t feel any and didn’t _want _to, but rather to see if he could somehow convince (or, as others who had witnessed similar events in the past might describe it: manipulate, bully, coerce) Skull into playing guinea pig for an experiment or two. 

He discovered, much to his general annoyance and - more importantly - sense of curiosity, that Skull was not actually tinkering around on anything in the garage, and _was _indeed just lying flat on his back on the floor, tools discarded in piles around him as he stared blankly up at the ceiling, face twisted into a deep grimace as he contemplated something, so deep in his thoughts he failed to notice Verde squinting at him from the door. 

Oodako, however, seemed perfectly amiable and observant, and offered a slow wave of a tentacle in greeting to Verde from where he was plopped atop the hood of a car. 

Verde glanced at him, then stared at Skull for several more seconds - Skull’s expression shifted from ‘grimace’ to ‘deep consternation mixed with some degree of horror’ right back to ‘grimace’ in the span of no more than three such seconds - mentally noted down the date and time to jot down in his notes later, along with this strange break in character, then closed the door and went on his way. 

Finally, thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, Reborn discovered his missing cake. 

2.33

A week following the fateful (as some might describe, with the great gift of hindsight) changes found the Arcobaleno in another meeting - not one engineered by Yuni, shockingly enough, but pulled together and arranged by Colonnello, and - most notably - excluding Skull. 

“Okay,” Colonnello said, in a brave attempt to command the attentions of the Arcobaleno scattered around the room. “So I’ve gathered you all here today—”

“We live in the same house,” Reborn said. “Not much of a feat.”

“There had better be a good reason for this,” Mammon said, leaning against the far wall with their arms folded across their chest. “I have much more lucrative things to be doing with my time.” 

“I have to concur,” Verde said, adjusting his glasses and narrowing his eyes at Colonnello with all the icy disapproval his awkward, gangly, twelve year old body could muster. “I have _several _time sensitive experiments I have to attend to.”

“Right,” Colonnello said, through gritted teeth, feeling his right eye begin to twitch slightly. “So, _like I was saying_—”

“Are you feeling alright?” Fon inquired, eyeing Colonnello with a carefully calculated amount of displayed concern, the polite _bastard_. “You seem a little…” Fon paused, tastefully, allowing for several implications to fill the space of his silence. “...unwell.” 

“You look like shit,” Lal supplied, bluntly, looking utterly unimpressed as she narrowed her eyes at Colonnello. Fon made a noise of agreement and tilted his head at Lal, nodding genially at her assessment. “Have you been sleeping?”

“That doesn’t matter,” Colonnello said dismissively, because the alternative would be telling Lal that, actually, no, he hadn’t been. A few eyebrows were raised at him judgmentally. “More importantly—”

“Oh, hey!” Skull said, wandering into the sitting room they were gathered in. “What’s going on—”

Colonnello reached over to a side table and picked up a decorational statue - some sort of weird glass horse thing that no one really liked, so not a _great _loss - and threw it at him. Skull yelped and ducked, and the decoration shattered on the wall behind him. 

“_You could have just asked me to leave_,” Skull said despairingly, already scrambling out of the room. 

The eyebrows around the room arched further in judgement, although Reborn, to his credit, looked more entertained than anything. 

He was, perhaps, the only one. 

“_So_,” Colonnello said, feeling vastly better and far more cheerful. “Like I’ve been trying to say - I’ve called you all here because we need to discuss something important.”

“Money,” Mammon offered up immediately. “The way we budget this household is _atrocious_. We don’t need half the things you all _insist _on purchasing. We would all benefit from using a less expensive brand of coffee, for one, and there’s really no difference between one ply and four ply toilet paper, we could afford to go cheaper - and don’t get me _started _on whoever’s been ordering _paper _and _printer toner_ this week—”

“Budgetary expenses?” Verde scoffed. “I think the matter of our aging process is much more important. I believe we can all agree that it’s taking far too long, and we need a much better solution. If I could run a few tests on everyone, perhaps—”

“While we’re here,” Fon said, apparently deciding to contribute to the free-for-all the meeting was swiftly devolving into. “I must admit, I have some concerns about—”

“Just _try _to take my coffee,” Reborn threatened, narrowing his eyes at Mammon. 

Lal said nothing, though a vein in her forehead was beginning to throb, and her face had settled into a look of deep annoyance. 

“There’s no need for coffee to be so expensive! You’re being scammed—”

“You wouldn’t say that if you tried it, you—”

“—and if I could draw some blood, hook up a few machines—”

“—not to name any names, of course, but I feel most of us can agree that _some _of the manners and personal hygiene around here are, to put it lightly, revolting—”

Colonnello took a moment to wonder _why_, exactly, the other Arcobaleno hadn’t deigned to pull together a meeting of their own, if their concerns were so damn urgent - and then he took a deep breath and said, loudly, over the cacophony of voices, “It’s about Skull!”

The wildly escalating conversations cut themselves off quickly as everyone swerved their attentions back towards Colonnello in absolute befuddlement. 

“What.” Verde said. 

The sentiment seemed to be echoed throughout the rest of the Arcobaleno. 

“We need to talk about Skull,” Colonnello said, very seriously. 

“...Alright,” Mammon sighed, pushing themself off the wall. “I’m leaving. This was a waste of time.”

They disappeared with a quick flare of Mist flames. Verde let out an annoyed huff of sorts, adjusted his glasses, tossed Colonnello one last annoyed, derisive stare, and walked out without another word. 

Fon tilted his head. “What about Skull? Is everything alright?”

Colonnello quickly considered all of his options, then decided that a great deal of bluntness was necessary at this stage, to cut to the heart of the matter. “No,” he said. “Because Skull’s hiding something from us.” 

Far away in the distance, Colonnello swore he heard a pin drop. 

“Colonnello,” Lal sighed. “This is ridiculous—”

“No,” Reborn said, settling himself more comfortably in his chair - one leg tossed over the other, an elbow propped up against the arm of the chair, his chin resting atop his hand - as he regarded Colonnello with a shrewd gaze. “This should be interesting. What’s the lackey hiding from us, then?”

“I haven’t figured that out yet,” Colonnello said. “But—”

“Jesus _Christ_,” Lal said. She stood and marched out of the room. 

“I have theories!” Colonnello called after her. “Things start to make a lot of sense if you think about it!” 

Lal didn’t bother looking back as she yelled, “Go to sleep, you goddamn idiot!” 

“No, don’t bother,” Reborn said, his chair somehow several feet closer to Colonnello than it had been before Colonnelo had glanced away. “Tell me more about this. I’m deeply intrigued and concerned and would love to hear your thoughts.”

Fon glanced between Colonnello and Reborn, eyebrows slowly inching higher and higher. 

Colonnello stared at Reborn with narrowed eyes and said, flatly, “You’re fucking with me, aren’t you.”

“I just want answers,” Reborn said earnestly, which was all the confirmation Colonnello needed. 

Colonnello ran a hand through his hair and rose to his feet. “None of you believe me,” Colonnello said. “Fine. I’ll just have to find something that’ll convince you enough to hear me out.” 

“Good luck,” Reborn said, insincerely. 

Colonnello flipped him off, then headed out of the room. The glass from the destroyed statue crunched under his shoes, and he could hear Fon murmur, “Is it really wise to egg him on?” as he passed through the doorway. 

He should have expected this, really. The first step towards convincing them to hear him out: finding a piece of evidence solid enough to make them sit down and shut up for the ten minutes it would take for Colonnello to actually _talk _about it. Colonnello had plenty of theories and conjectures - hell, he had a whole _list_, bulleted and everything, full of odds and ends that didn’t quite _fit _when it came to Skull - but none of it would help without anything physical he could wave around and point to… 

As he walked up the stairs and down the hall to his bedroom, ready to spend a few hours strategizing on his next move, his eyes lighted upon Skull’s slightly ajar bedroom door, the room within dark and shadowed. 

Perhaps this called for a more hands on and physical means of investigation, right at one of the few sources available to him. 

Colonnello had never been afraid to get his hands dirty. 

* * *

“—an absolute _ass_,” Colonnello heard Skull grumble, an indeterminate amount of time later, as the doorknob turned and his bedroom door swung open. “Honestly, what the hell is that supposed to mean? ‘You might find something interesting in your bedroom, lackey’—_what the fuck_?!”

“Um,” Colonnello said. “I can explain.”

Skull blinked at him, looking utterly horrified. “I think,” he said, faintly, “I might prefer if you didn’t.”

“This isn’t what it looks like—”

“I don’t want to know about any of your weird fetishes—”

“_What the hell are you_—this isn’t a fetish!”

“What you and Lal do privately in your spare time is none of my business,” Skull said, speaking very fast, face screwed up in distaste, “and quite frankly, senpai, _I do not want to know_, but I think this is a step too far—”

“This doesn’t have anything to do with that!” Colonnello hissed. “Me and Lal aren’t—get your head out of the gutter!”

“_Then get your hands out of my underwear drawer!_” 

“This isn’t-” Colonnello started, and then looked down and actually _focused _on what he was digging through, fighting past the worsening fog in his head. “-Ah,” he finished lamely, yanking his hands out and wiping them on his pants, battling down a grimace as he gingerly nudged the drawer closed. 

“Ah?” Skull said. “_Ah?_” 

“Watch your tone, lackey,” Colonnello warned, pointing a finger between the two Skulls that wavered in his vision. 

“Um,” Skull said, paling slightly as Colonnello took a step forward. Then he frowned, looking alarmed. “Uh, senpai?”

The world was blurring and twisting and turning, swimming in and out of his vision - Colonnello’s last, hazy thought, was that the fuzzy rugs Skull insisted on tossing about his room were surprisingly comfortable. 

2.67

“I’m going to kick Reborn’s ass,” Colonnello declared from his bed in the pseudo infirmary, many hours of good (forced) rest later, and with most of his sensibilities (fortunately) returned to him. 

Verde turned a page of his newspaper unconcernedly. “Hm,” he said, though it wasn’t quite clear if this was in response to Colonnello’s declaration or to something of particular interest in the newspaper. 

“Great,” Colonnello said, kicking the blankets off himself and sliding off the bed, hurrying to the door. “Glad we’ve got that cleared up, kora.”

Verde looked up from his newspaper as the door slammed shut, and then, with a sigh, he leaned over to his desk and clicked on a voice recorder. “Day two hundred and ninety-nine,” he said, completely monotone. “Colonnello appears to be losing his mind.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> honestly, in retrospect, maybe part of my hesitance over posting this chapter was hesitance over how much self-indulgent ridiculousness i could get away with, lmao (the answer to that varies depending on your levels of self-indulgence. unfortunately, i have not found my limit, hedonistic wastrel that i am) 
> 
> anyway! apologies for how late this chapter is! i have several rather good excuses to offer y'all, but suffice it to say that life got really busy for me, and i lost a few notes for a couple of my stories, haha, including this one. 
> 
> this chapter was more a set-up chapter i guess? in the long scheme of things, if i'm remembering things correctly... a lot of the events here will be used as a, er... springboard of sorts? for future events. don't uh, read too much into that, tho. regardless! i do hope you were all entertained. thank you all again so much for your patience, and for the lovely comments, kudos, etc. i appreciated and loved every single one so much!!! i also.... did not expect this kind of attention for this fic, it was very surprising. (also, i'd like to apologize again for the lateness of my replies to y'all! sorry, life has been completely and totally wack.) 
> 
> if you'd like to find me anywhere else, you can find me @ cinnars.tumblr.com
> 
> i hope you all are staying safe, and that this chapter finds you in good health!


	3. 3.00 - 3.80

3.00 

“If you ask me,” Reborn said. “You went about it the wrong way.”

Colonnello flicked a crumpled up ball of paper at him irritably. “I _didn’t _ask,” he said. “That whole thing was your fault anyway, you bastard.”

“_I _didn’t tell you to go rummaging through Skull’s things and faint on his floor,” Reborn said, peering at one of the papers Colonnello had pinned up to his wall. 

“I didn’t _faint_.”

“Oh, my mistake. Swooned, then.”

Colonnello hefted a book in his hand consideringly, gauging its weight - and then tossed it at Reborn’s head. Reborn smoothly stepped to the side, allowing the book to hit the wall with a loud _thunk_, rustling the papers. 

“What’s it to you, anyway? None of you believe me about this, you’ve made _that_ quite clear, kora.”

“Hm,” Reborn said, stepping back and giving Colonnello’s room an exaggerated once-over. “I wonder why.”

“Does being a complete asshole come naturally to you, or do you have to work at it?”

“Don’t throw stones from glass houses, Colonnello,” Reborn said, dismissively. “Now, like I was saying - you went about it the wrong way.”

“You’re the one that _sold me out_,” Colonnello said, outraged. 

“Relevant details only, please.”

“_How is that not fucking relevant you goddamn_—” Colonnello cut himself off, head swinging to his door as he caught Skull passing by out of the corner of his eye, the tread of his boots heavy and muffled against the hallway rug. Colonnello held up a finger, said, “This conversation is not over,” and hopped off his bed, hurrying to yank the door open wide enough to stick his head out. “Skull!”

Skull froze, then turned very, very slowly. “Oh,” he said, voice filled with dread. “Senpai.”

“You look like you’re going somewhere, kora.” Colonnello observed, narrowing his eyes. 

Skull tilted his head down, as though examining himself, then glanced back up at Colonnello hesitantly. “I guess that is how it looks,” he said, slowly, as if wondering where Colonnello was going with this. 

“_Hm_,” Colonnello said, thoughtfully, the barest tinges of suspicion coloring his tone. “Strange, considering we can’t ‘_go_’ anywhere.”

Skull’s eyes flickered around the hallway uncomfortably. “We aren’t confined to the mansion _all _the time,” Skull hedged, uncertainly. “I mean. Fresh air is good.”

“_Hm_,” Colonnello said, again. “C’mere, lackey.”

Skull shuffled a sparse few centimeters closer, then stopped. Colonnello rolled his eyes. “_C’mere_,” he said. “I’m not gonna bite you, kora.”

Skull’s face expressed a certain kind of disbelief, though he did tentatively slide closer. “Yes, senpai?”

“Wait here,” Colonnello companded imperiously. “I’m going with you.”

Skull spluttered. “_What_?”

“What are you, deaf?” Colonnello didn’t bother to wait for a reply as he leaned back and shut the door firmly, hurrying to his closet to find his jacket. He nudged aside several boxes, gently toed around several piles of loose paper, and, for a brief moment, contemplated the disaster zone his bedroom had become. 

“Hey, Reborn,” Colonnello called out, after a few minutes of searching in vain. “Have you seen—” he paused, realizing with some degree of horror that he hadn’t heard _anything _from Reborn in the last few minutes, something that could, in the right moments, be indicative of a disaster - and turned, just in time to see Reborn pull the door wide open. 

“Oh, lackey,” Reborn greeted, cheerfully, as alarm bells went off in Colonnello’s head. “Waiting for Colonnello, I see. Don’t just stand out there. Come in, have a seat, make yourself comfortable. If you move that pile of books to the floor—”

“_What the fuck_,” Skull said, standing a few steps in from the doorway, eyes wide as he stared around the room. 

Reborn, standing at his side, made a noise of sudden realization. As though this _exact_ reaction hadn’t occurred to him and wasn’t, indeed, why he opened the _goddamn _door in the first place. “Ah, right,” Reborn said, offhandedly. “It is a little cluttered in here, isn’t it?” He paused, then gestured to a chair. “If you’d just move those books to the floor—”

Skull shook his head slowly, eyes still wide and unblinking as they darted around, drinking everything in. A few inarticulate noises fell out of his mouth as he backed away, slowly, then turned and fled once he was clear of the doorway. 

Reborn watched him go, and clicked his tongue sympathetically. “Your jacket’s underneath your bed,” he said to Colonnello, absently. 

Colonnello closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Hey, Reborn?” he said, very calmly. _Count to ten. Count to ten. Count to—_

“Hm?” There was an aggravatingly familiar, smug edge to Reborn’s voice. 

Colonnello swiftly discarded any peaceful, non-violent option as a way to end this unfortunate interaction, and opened his eyes, narrowing them hatefully at Reborn. Then, without another word, he launched himself forward to beat that intolerable look right off Reborn’s face. 

3.20

“This is an intervention,” Lal said, an indeterminable amount of hours later. Her arms were crossed as she stood in the doorway, stare heavy with disapproval. 

“For who?” Reborn asked, from where he leaned against the wall unconcernedly, tossing his fedora up and down. His suit was rumpled, his tie was missing, and one of his shoelaces had been untied and half yanked out, for some godforsaken reason.

“For the both of you,” Lal said. “You’re taking this way too far. Skull refuses to step foot in the mansion now, which _completely _negates the reason why we’re here in the first place. Fix it.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” both Reborn and Colonnello said at the same time. They paused, then narrowed their eyes at each other. 

“Don’t think I don’t know that you’re hanging around just to fuck with me,” Colonnello said. _His_ shoes were missing completely, along with one of his socks, and his headband had been yanked down to lay around his neck, his hair in complete disarray. 

Lal suppressed the urge to shake the both of them violently. 

“No,” Reborn replied, glibly. “I have a deep belief in everything you’ve been saying. It all makes so much sense.”

“You _fucker_,” Colonnello said, throwing himself at Reborn. 

Reborn side-stepped, and Colonnello narrowly avoided collision with the wall by pivoting on his feet, one of his legs shooting out to kick Reborn’s knee in. Reborn easily hooked his foot around Colonnello’s and brought them crashing down, where they rolled about, wrestling roughly with one another. 

“This is pathetic,” Reborn taunted, the palm of his hand pressing Colonnello’s face roughly into the floor. “What, haven’t been keeping up with your training?”

“You’re _insufferable_,” Colonnello said, knocking Reborn’s arm away roughly and headbutting him. 

Lal tapped her foot against the floor impatiently and gave Colonnello’s room a onceover. 

The walls were overtaken with pinned up newspaper clippings, photographs, pages ripped out from books, and scribbled on pieces of paper - all of which were connected with red yarn, and _all _of which, presumably, had something to do with Skull. Lal had serious doubts. 

All the strings met in what Lal assumed to be the epicenter of evidence of Colonnello’s evidently unstable, possibly disturbed mind: a large piece of paper that had _WHAT IS SKULL HIDING? _scrawled on it in big, blocky blue letters. 

Newspapers, books, and boxes containing more evidence of Colonnello’s instability were scattered throughout the room, with papers and markers and yarn strewn around on the floor. As Reborn and Colonnello rolled around, they knocked down an open container of pins, scattered them everywhere. Colonnello let out a yelp as he rolled onto them, and then he reached out to scoop a handful of them up and toss them at Reborn’s face. 

Lal walked out, slamming the door behind her. She’d come back in an hour or two, once they had a moment to work their energy out. It wasn’t worth the headache right now. She had _other things to do_. She couldn’t spend _all _of her time corralling the rest of the Arcobaleno into acting like the adults they _were_, instead of the children they appeared to be. 

And, right now, she had a few things to puzzle out, herself - like why Skull couldn’t look her in the eyes anymore, for one. 

3.40

“Jesus,” Colonnello grumbled tiredly, lying spread eagled on the floor. “What’s gotten into you lately?”

He hastily rolled out the way as Reborn aimed a lazy kick at him, also lying on the floor. “I could ask you the same thing,” Reborn drawled out. “When did you decide to set up a shrine to Skull in your bedroom?”

Colonnello spluttered. “It’s not a shrine, kora!”

Reborn lifted his head to glance around pointedly, his eyebrows quirked at Colonnello in a way that suggested a great deal of incredulity. 

“It’s _not_,” Colonnello said irritably, tossing another handful of pins at Reborn, who batted them aside without blinking an eye. “It’s an _investigation_.”

“Right,” Reborn said. “Because Skull is _hiding something _from us.”

“You are _unbearable_,” Colonnello said. “Have I mentioned that lately?”

“You’re being absurd,” Reborn said. Then, after a small pause, “Also, you really should start training more. You’re rusty.” Ignoring the beginning of Colonnello’s indignant reply, turning his head so that Colonnello could see how his eyes narrowed and glinted maliciously, he continued with, “Too much _cake_, perhaps?”

“You’re still on that?” Colonnello said, exasperated. 

Reborn smiled in a way that sent shivers down Colonnello’s spine. “_Still_?” he said. “I’ve only just gotten started.”

Colonnello rolled his eyes. “You’re so dramatic, kora,” he said, then let out a wheeze as Reborn’s elbow came out of nowhere and buried itself in Colonnello’s stomach.

“You’re slow,” Reborn said, smugly. 

“I’ll show you _slow_, you _bastard_—”

3.60

“Come on, Skull,” Fon said, staring up at the tree branch where Skull sat, frowning down at Fon as he cradled Oodako in his arms and swung his legs in the air. “You can’t stay here. We’re in the middle of nowhere.”

“Me and Oodako are staying right here,” Skull said, stubbornly. 

“Skull. You can’t do that.”

“_Watch _me.”

“I don’t want to,” Fon said, plainly. “And I also don’t particularly enjoy the thought of being stuck as a twelve year old for however long it takes the three of you to work things out.”

“Colonnello and Reborn have gone _crazy_,” Skull insisted, not budging an inch. “Colonnello keeps _watching _me - he’s not even being subtle anymore! And Reborn keeps egging him on, he thinks it’s funny-” Skull let out a frustrated noise, arms tightening slightly around Oodako, “-and I went in Colonnello’s room, and he had all this weird, creepy shit set up like he was _investigating _me, and—”

“We’ll make him take it down,” Fon said. 

Skull squinted down at Fon, his bottom lip jutting out in a pout. “I’m not hiding _anything_,” he said, voice rising to a whine. “I’m just _me_.”

Fon smiled up at him. “We know who you are, Skull,” Fon said. “I imagine Colonnello is just bored. Too much time spent cooped up in the mansion.”

“Yeah, must be,” Skull said. Then, somewhat spitefully, “He’s losing his _marbles_.”

Fon tilted his head in a way that meant, _you have a point there_. 

After another moment where Skull frowned at the ground, looking frustrated, he finally shifted Oodako to his shoulder and hopped down. “Alright,” he said. “I’ll come back to the mansion. Being stuck as a twelve year old sucks, anyway.” Then, tossed out as an afterthought, “But if I find Colonnello rustling through my underwear again, I swear to _god_ I’m leaving and never coming back.”

Fon choked. “_What_?”

3.80

Colonnello had a plan. 

It was something he had formulated during the time he had spent taking down his investigative board - after being strong-armed into it by Lal and Fon, who both staunchly refused to take ‘_no_’ and (alternatively) ‘_hell no_’ for an answer. 

Why try to _hunt down _what Skull might be hiding - Colonnello had his suspicions, of course - if the lackey could just tell Colonnello himself? Unfortunately, that did mean that Skull would have to feel _somewhat _comfortable enough to confide in him, which _did _mean—

“Remember,” Colonnello said. “We’re being _nice _to him.”

“I can do nice,” Reborn said, having somehow weaseled his way into this. He seemed oddly and unpleasantly delighted at the thought. 

Colonnello shot him a dubious look. Reborn adjusted his fedora smugly and folded his arms across his chest. Colonnello contemplated knocking his teeth in. 

“_Nice_,” Colonnello repeated. “The actual meaning of the word, not the Reborn definition, kora.”

Reborn peered down at Colonnello condescendingly, using every inch of his _barely _superior height to tower over Colonnello. “_Nice_,” Reborn parroted, mockingly. “The actual meaning of the word, not the _Colonnello _definition.”

“I know how to be nice!”

“Oh, sure,” Reborn said, extremely patronizingly. “Just to be certain, you might want to consider looking it up in the dictionary.” He paused, then said, “It’s _after _the ‘m’ section, and _before _the ‘o’ section, just to be clear, I know literacy isn’t your _best _trait—”

“This is going to be a disaster,” Colonnello said. Then he tackled Reborn, knocking his stupid fedora off his head and slamming him into the ground. To his great delight, Colonnello noted that Reborn managed to hit his head not _once, _but _twice _\- first on the arm of a chair as he went down, then again, on the _actual _floor. 

(Colonnello would later reflect on this moment - with great glee - and note that the sound of Reborn’s skull colliding with the finely polished wooden floorboards could be, indeed, the greatest symphony to have graced his eardrums. Even better, perhaps, was the string of curses Reborn let out directly afterwards, the tone of his voice missing much of his smug, superior air.) 

Still, despite that cheerful, optimistic prediction, Colonnello had a great deal of confidence in this new strategy - all they had to do was be _nice _to the lackey, after all. Treat him a little better, maybe stop throwing things at him… 

How hard could it be?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *enter a terrible rendition of bon jovi's 'livin' on a prayer' here* 
> 
> yeah, how hard could being nice to skull be? hm... 
> 
> honestly, i could probably write a million words of reborn and colonnello just annoying the absolute everloving _shit_ out of each other.... w guest appearances by skull. they entertain me so much.... the _dynamics_..... _hmmmm_
> 
> so! there might be a few mistakes scattered here or there in this chapter bc it's uh... well, depending on how you look at it, either _very_ early or _very_ late here, and my brain is sorta... hm. tired? if you see any, feel free to point them out to me & i'll be happy to correct them! 
> 
> a joke from my joke of an outline, because i can't help myself, evidently: 
> 
> colonnello, who has been ordering paper and printing toner in ridiculous amounts so he can plaster his bedroom walls with evidence of his sins: *has to clean it up*
> 
> mammon, wandering by and discovering this, utterly horrified: you!!!!! you are my enemy!!!!!! ! ! !!
> 
> anyway, the alternative joke title for next chapter is, if everything goes according to plan: 'Reborn Pulls A Trunchbull' 
> 
> thank you all so much for the comments, kudos, etc!!! i did sorta like.... end up just giggling furiously to myself out of pure joy every time i got an email from ao3 notifying me, which _did_ get me some odd looks from people on occasion, but it was completely worth it. again, thank you all!!! i hope everyone is staying happy n healthy n safe, and i hope y'all found some form of entertainment in this update 💕


	4. 4.00 - 4.91

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hiya folks! it is at this time that i kindly ask you to recall the tag 'about 1/2 crack 1/2 'this probably doesn't exactly qualify as crack huh' n 100 percent tomfoolery' because it _was_ intended to encapsulate this fic as a whole, but also was partially mostly written with, um. this chapter in mind. we are welcoming some reason back into the room, to rest after their long journey. everyone say welcome back, very tired and exhausted semi-reasonable-ness. perhaps do not expect them to stay long. they're very busy and we will most likely be ushering them right back out for ch 5. thank you very much for understanding. 
> 
> also also, totally unimportant, but i wrote this entire chapter while listening to 'the last day of summer' from tlt musical on repeat, which was kinda a weird vibe, considering what i was writing. my brain refused to work w/o it tho, so i made do, haha.

4.00

It wasn’t like the new changes were bad, exactly. They were just… _puzzling._

“...At least Colonnello isn’t stalking him anymore,” Fon said, slowly. 

They watched through the glass as Skull shrieked in the training room below and flipped out of the way of a particularly vicious kick from Reborn. 

Lal shrugged, seemingly unconcerned. “It’s not bad,” she said. “It’s beneficial.”

Fon couldn’t argue with that, exactly. Training _was _more beneficial than stalking, sowing chaos, and, for some godforsaken reason, rummaging through underwear drawers. “Why the sudden change of heart?”

There was a small moment of silence, and then Lal said, slowly, reluctantly, “I don’t think there’s been a change of heart. Just a change in strategy.”

Fon tilted his head and scrutinized Colonnello’s figure below. “So he’s trying to… _beat _whatever he thinks Skull’s hiding out of him?”

“Well, actually,” Lal said, sounding somewhat amused. “He’s being _nice_.”

Fon paused, then re-examined the last few days in a new light. “Ah,” he said. 

“Ah,” Lal echoed. 

In the room below, Skull gave another inaudible shriek as Colonnello grabbed the back of Skull’s shirt and kicked his legs out from under him, slamming him to the ground. 

“There are probably better ways to go about that,” Fon said. He could think of three such ways off the top of his head.

Lal shrugged again, arms crossed over her chest, and watched with sharp, critical eyes as Skull used Colonnello’s shoulders as a springboard and propelled himself into the air, managing to narrowly avoid getting nicked by the bullets Reborn was cheerfully firing off. From the looks of things, Skull was swearing up a storm. 

“You know,” Lal said, suddenly. “Skull can’t look me in the eyes anymore.” 

“Oh?” Fon said, having absolutely no idea why Lal would be bringing this up to him. 

“I can’t figure out why,” Lal continued, thoughtfully. “I don’t think it’s because of anything I did, because I haven’t _done _anything, but it _is _annoying.” 

“Hm,” Fon said, still without any real understanding of why Lal wanted to discuss this with him. “Well, when did it start?”

A beat of silence, then, “After this whole Colonnello debacle began.”

Fon concealed his wince. “Ah,” he said. “Well, maybe you should bring it up to Colonnello. Perhaps he did something.”

Lal cast a thoughtful look down at Colonnello. “Maybe I will,” she said. Another pregnant pause, then, “In any case, I think I’ll go down and join them. The holes in Skull’s defense are…” Lal trailed off, then closed her eyes and shook her head slowly, almost mournfully, as though she was in a great deal of pain. Then she turned and marched out of the room. 

Fon watched her go, and as the door swished shut behind her, returned his attention to the three in the training room below. 

Colonnello and Reborn were being _nice_. To _Skull_. 

Fon wondered if anyone had tried to communicate that astonishing fact to Skull himself, or if they were just expecting him to pick up on the sparse, far-fetched clues on his own. 

Fon watched Colonnello duck under Skull’s kick, then grab Skull’s leg and toss him at the opposite wall, where Reborn waited - and he hid the incredulous laugh that bubbled out of his throat behind the sleeve of his changshan. 

Unbelievable didn’t quite cover it. 

4.09

This was much harder than Colonnello anticipated it being, strangely enough. 

He didn’t get it. 

“I don’t get it,” Colonnello said, aloud. 

Reborn, who was sitting opposite him and gently running a finger along Leon’s spine, hummed inquisitively, in a way that implied Reborn didn’t particularly care much about whatever Colonnello was rambling on about. 

Colonnello gave serious thought to kicking Reborn’s chair over, but ultimately decided not to, out of the kindness of his heart. 

See? More niceties. Colonnello was _trying _here. 

Instead, Colonnello rolled his eyes and stood, pacing out of the room to go find Skull and drag him to do more training. They could work more on endurance today - Colonnello poked his head into Skull’s room, already mapping out a course for them in his head. 

Skull wasn’t in his room. 

He wasn’t in the garage either, or in the basement, or lurking nervously in the library, or camping out in the wine cellar - _all _various places Colonnello had tracked Skull down to in the last few days. The one that _really_ took the cake, though, was when Colonnello had found him hiding _on_ the chandelier, peering down at Colonnello with large, baleful eyes. 

Sometimes it was easy to forget about what a circus freak Skull was, until he pulled shit like that. 

The real frustrating thing, though, wasn’t that Colonnello had been forced into playing a bizarre game of hide-n-seek with Skull - it was that Colonnello was being _nice _here, and no one even seemed to notice, least of all _Skull_, who was avoiding him _more_. 

In general, he thought he’d been doing pretty great. He’d cut down on the whole ‘throwing things at him’ issue - he’d only done it _once _in the last two days, and that was _during _training - and training was _fun_. They’d been making leaps and bounds in improvements on Skull’s part - though Colonnello had noted a particular reluctance from him. It was unfortunate, but Colonnello had figured Skull would come around. 

Skull was _not _coming around. Skull had apparently made it his life goal to avoid Colonnello as much as possible, and make it _extremely _difficult to be found. 

“This is ridiculous,” Colonnello muttered to himself, surveying the attic with sharp eyes. “Skull, just come out already. I know you’re up here, kora!” 

He was met with deafening silence. 

What was he doing wrong?

4.18

The thing was, Fon reflected to himself, as he observed the efforts Colonnello was putting forth, was that Colonnello was not an _un_kind man. He was hardworking and loyal, and when he put his mind to something, _it was going to get done_, come hell or high water. It was debatable, sometimes, whether or not these were _good _traits - there was such a thing as working too hard, or sacrificing _too _much for the sake of loyalties and friendships, or focusing too intently on the wrong thing at the wrong time - but they weren’t bad, either. 

He was inclined to be a bit too competitive, and maybe he could be a but too loud or brash or overly self-confident in a way that could be off-putting at times, and he had a strange fondness for stealing other people’s food - but these things didn’t make him bad or unkind either, necessarily. 

He was disposed towards being distrustful to people he considered to be _fake _or _dishonest _in some way, which was partly why, Fon had figured, Colonnello not only attached himself so quickly to Lal, who didn’t see the _point_ of not being bluntly, painfully honest and up-front (when it came to most things, that was. Lal had her own discretions, as they all did) but also why Colonnello seemed so dead set on uncovering whatever mysterious secret he believed Skull to be keeping. 

If there was anything Colonnello liked about Skull - despite how he would never admit it, least of all to himself - it was likely to be how painfully, honestly, and _obnoxiously_ Skull was himself. If there was any Arcobaleno that was an open book, it was Skull. Fon imagined that Colonnello coming to the conclusion that Skull was faking it in some way, or hiding something, must have been a very large affront to his sensibilities and his trust. 

Colonnello _also_ had his ways of showing affection - mostly physical, as he was a fairly tactile person, but also in how or where he spent his time. 

Neither of those things were a problem. 

The ways he _expressed _those affections, however… 

Colonnello wasn’t an unkind man, no, not necessarily - but he was an Arcobaleno, and, before that, a military man. 

And he was going about this _completely _the wrong way. 

“Fon,” Skull hissed, looking about two seconds away from grabbing Fon’s shoulders and shaking him violently. “_Please_. I need to _hide_. Colonnello is trying to _kill _me.” There was a wild look in Skull’s eyes, and he glanced up and down the hallway in a paranoid, hunted sort of fashion. 

Fon stepped to the side and gestured to his room. “You—” he started, then was cut off as Skull darted past him without another word. 

“Right,” Fon said, watching as Skull slid himself under the bed. He shook his head, then closed the door and turned to go find Colonnello. 

It wouldn’t be hard. These days, wherever Skull went, Colonnello usually wasn’t far behind. 

4.27

Colonnello had suddenly and inexplicably found himself sequestered in a sitting room with Fon, who was calmly pouring tea for the both of them. 

“Right,” Colonnello said, feeling uncannily like he had just been bowled over by a whirlwind. “So, I guess, since I’m here…” He rapped his knuckles against the table, and continued, reluctantly, “I need advice, kora.” He paused, frowned, then said, “And you’re supposedly the nicest out of all of us, so.”

Colonnello had his doubts, of course. Fon was certainly the most _polite_, but polite did not have to correlate to _nice _in any way whatsoever. There was a _very _fine line between the two, and Fon walked it with varying success every day of his goddamn life. 

“What high praise,” Fon said, with a placid smile. “You need help being… nice, then, I presume?”

“I don’t need _help_,” Colonnello said, defensively. “I know how to be nice.”

Fon lifted his cup to blow at the surface of tea contemplatively. “Why are you here, then?”

“I’m _here_ because you _dragged _me here, you—”

“_That_ doesn’t sound nice,” Fon commented, lightly. 

Colonnello snapped his mouth shut with an audible _click_, and swallowed back the urge to toss his cup of tea in Fon’s face and call it a day. It was a pleasant thought. Colonnello pushed it to the back of his mind to daydream about later, and snapped, “I’m not trying to be nice to _you_. I’m being _nice _to—”

“Skull,” Fon said, nodding along. “Yes, I’ve noticed.”

Colonnello let out a triumphant sound and gestured at Fon pointedly. “Yes! You can see it, can’t you? I’ve been nice! I’ve been training with him, I’ve been giving him tips, the only thing I’ve tossed at his head in the last few days was a rock, and that was _during _training—”

“Sure,” Fon said, cutting Colonnello off. “I’m just a little curious. Could I ask _how _you stumbled upon this method of…” Fon paused, then continued, just a second too slow to go unnoticed, “...kindness?”

“I wouldn’t go _that _fucking far, kora.” Colonnello said. 

Fon blinked at him, took a sip of his tea, and waited. 

“I just,” Colonnello started, feeling oddly embarrassed and put on the spot. “Figured it might be nice to include him. In training. And stuff. Instead of just yelling and kicking him around.” And then, hastily, “Not that that’s not fun either, of course.”

“Of course,” Fon echoed, somewhat judgmentally. 

“And, well, I’ve noticed a few things. From when he would try and invade Mafia Land.” Colonnello snorted, face lighting up in amusement. “Not that you could call _those _pathetic attempts an _invasion_, I mean for god’s sake, he couldn’t even manage a proper—” Colonnello caught sight of the look of near-impatience on Fon’s face, and coughed. “Uh, that is. I noticed a few things we could work on to help the idiot not get himself killed. And we’ve been making _plenty _of progress - we’d probably be making even more if he wasn’t so damn insistent on dragging his feet every step of the way.”

“Hm,” Fon said, noncommittally. “And may I ask _how _you’ve communicated this desire to improve Skull’s abilities and keep him alive and unhurt?”

“You make it sound weird,” Colonnello said, distastefully. “Look, I just tell him what to do, and he does it. Eventually. With some incentive.”

“_Hm_,” Fon said, again. He set his teacup down with a _clink_, and rested his hands in his lap. “You don’t think there’s any room for miscommunication there?”

Colonnello stared at him. “I tell him what to do,” he said. “There’s not much room for _miscommunicating_ there, no.” Then Colonnello leaned back and tossed his hands into the air. “Besides,” he said, exasperated. “I _love _training. And that’s the fucking Golden Rule, isn’t it? Treat other people how you’d like to be treated?”

Fon had a sudden and inexplicable coughing fit. Once recovered, he took a sip of his tea, wiped at his mouth with a napkin, and cleared his throat. “The intent is kind,” Fon said, generously. 

“Great!” Colonnello said. “So I’m not doing anything wrong, am I?” He paused, contemplatively. “Maybe I should _increase _the training sessions,” he said. “That would probably get through to him, kora.”

“Colonnello,” Fon said, slowly. “You’re trying to treat Skull… how _you _would want to be treated.” There was a slight quirk to Fon’s lips that suggested the barest hint of incredulity, which Colonnello didn’t appreciate. 

“Yeah, I _just _said that.”

Fon looked as though he was teetering dangerously close to _‘polite’_ territory. “Colonnello,” he said, calmly. Too calmly. “You said you’re treating Skull the way _you _want to be treated. The way most of us would understand being treated.” Fon paused, then added, “Though _we _certainly wouldn’t tolerate it.” 

“Yes,” Colonnello said, dragging the word out slowly, wondering if Fon had perhaps slipped himself something extra in his tea. Casually, Colonnello nudged his cup away. He didn’t want any of what Fon was on, thank you very much. 

“We are not normal people,” Fon said, much slower. “Skull does _not _like to be treated the same way that _you _say you would be fine with being treated.” Left implied and unsaid, though clearly understood, _do you understand now, you incredible dumbass_. 

“Ah,” Colonnello said, because he did. 

“If you want to be nice to Skull,” Fon suggested. “Think of how a _normal person_ would like to be treated. Does that suffice?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Colonnello said, mulling it over. “Thanks.”

“My pleasure,” Fon said, in a way that meant, _fuck off_. 

Colonnello fucked off. 

4.36

Colonnello started things off slowly. He stopped pressing Skull so hard for training sessions, stopped hunting him down and waking him at insane hours of the morning to force him through various exercises, and, instead, when he passed Skull in the hall one day, wracked his brain for compliments - compliments were nice no matter _what_, right? - and blurted out the first thing that came to mind, which was, unfortunately, “I like octopus.”

Colonnello barely concealed his wince. 

Now, see, what Colonnello had _intended _to say was, “I like the way you’re able to communicate so effectively with Oodako and use that to your advantage in fights,” but part of his mind was so horrified by the foreign concept of a genuine compliment geared towards the lackey coming out of his mouth, that, instead, his brain flipped through some quick mental gymnastics - and bounced quite adeptly from _Oodako_, to _octopus_, to _octopus carpaccio_, a dish that Colonnello was quite fond of. And thus, the fumbled, half-formed thought, _I like octopus_, tumbled out, completely unwittingly. 

Skull, in return, who was _not _a mind reader, and could _not _divine any of this, had only one choice at hand, which was to take Colonnello at his word. Now, fortunately, Colonnello’s statement could be interpreted in a variety of ways, many of them positive. _Un_fortunately, however, in Skull’s paranoid mind, which was somewhat traumatized from the events of the past few weeks, this innocuous statement was - very obviously - a threat. 

“_YOU CAN’T EAT OODAKO_,” Skull shrieked at Colonnello, at the top of his lungs, before taking off and disappearing very quickly around the bend of the hallway. 

Colonnello watched him go and resisted the urge to sigh. There’d be more chances. Colonnello wasn’t bad at this. 

* * *

“Your, uh, makeup looks good today,” Colonnello said, the next day. Inwardly, he congratulated himself on getting that out without mangling it or sounding too strangled and pained. Makeup was a safe topic, anyway. Not related at all to any kind of creature Skull was emotionally attached to. And, bonus, Skull actually still cared about how it looked. 

…At least, Colonnello _assumed_. That was why Skull wore it, right? To look nice? If he went to such efforts everyday, he’d like to be complimented on it at least once, right? _And_ it was a nice thing to say. Colonnello was absolutely, definitely sure of that. There was no way it could be misinterpreted. 

Contrary to what Colonnello had expected, Skull stopped dead in his tracks. His mug went clattering to the ground, the handle snapping off as the tea soaked into the rug. “_What_,” Skull said, not sounding at all grateful or appreciative or happy. 

Colonnello wasn’t about to repeat himself, because he still had some dignity left, so he chalked it up to another loss, and kept walking. 

_I’m following Fon’s damn advice_, he thought, very uncharitably. _Why the fuck isn’t it working. _

4.45

Lal opened the fridge, then said, “Why is there so much cake in here.” 

Reborn turned the page in his newspaper unconcernedly. “Oh, that,” he said, in that tone of voice that always made Lal itch to slap him silly. “Don’t worry about it. It’s not for you.”

“Yes,” Lal said. “That absolutely makes it less concerning.”

“Good,” Reborn said, purposefully obtuse.

Lal stared at the contents of the fridge, looked deep within herself, decided that this was one battle she didn’t want to fight today, then grabbed her food out and (somewhat reluctantly, against her better, more rational thoughts) settled herself at the table across from Reborn.

“Have you given up on being ridiculous yet?” Lal asked Reborn.

“Hello Lal,” Reborn said, without looking up from his newspaper. “How has your day been? How have you been doing? Isn’t the weather outside nice, Lal? Oh, what are you eating, Lal, it smells quite delicious—”

“_Alright_,” Lal snapped. “I get it. _Hello _Reborn. Are you done being _completely fucking absurd_ yet?”

“Depends,” Reborn said, folding up his newspaper and setting it neatly on the table. “I know your definition of _absurd _tends to be a bit uncharitable.” 

Reborn possessed the peculiar, infuriating ability to make anyone and everyone have the murderous urge to shoot him full of bullets and stomp on his corpse, while also managing to charm to goddamn pants off anyone he wanted at the same time, and he wielded the power with a calculatedly careless grace, for maximum blood-boiling potential. 

Lal somehow found the self-control within herself to not reach over the table and start strangling him, and instead took a bite of her apple, staring Reborn down with violent intent while she chewed and swallowed. 

Fon entered the silent kitchen, eyed the two of them, and very carefully walked over to the fridge. “...Why is there so much cake in here,” he said. Fon paused, tilted his head, then frowned and wrinkled his nose slightly. “Are they _all _tiramisu?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Reborn said, which was about as comforting as when Lal last heard him utter those words. 

Fon stared at him, then shut the door. 

“So I heard you gave Colonnello some advice,” Reborn said, apropo of nothing. Fon raised an eyebrow, then pulled a chair out from the table and took a seat. He reached for the fruit bowl in the center and pulled out an orange. 

“I did,” he said, beginning to carefully peel it. The sharp scent of citrus rose in the air. 

“How fortuitous for him,” Reborn said. 

“One can only hope,” Fon said, calmly. 

The room descended into silence. Fon popped an orange slice into his mouth, then offered one to Lal, who accepted it, and Reborn, who declined. 

Verde wandered his way into the kitchen, nose stuffed into one of his notebooks as his pen scratched along the page. He was muttering indistinctly to himself as he made his way to the cabinets and retrieved his mug, setting about blindly pouring himself a cup of coffee. 

Lal considered a tactical retreat. She started to eat a little faster, inching her chair back from the table. 

Verde made his way to the fridge, reached in for his creamer, and frowned when it wasn’t in its usual place. He finally looked up. “What,” he said, flatly. He looked over to the others for an explanation. 

Wordlessly, Fon pointed at Reborn, who smiled charmingly back at Verde. 

Verde stared at him, very pointedly located and grabbed his creamer out, set it on the counter, and then began to write furiously in his notebook, his pen practically flying across the page. Lal half-expected him to rip through one of the papers in his fervor. 

Mammon drifted into the kitchen, stared around wordlessly, then turned to leave. 

“Wait,” Reborn called after them. Mammon halted, with obvious reluctance, then slowly turned to stare at Reborn. Reborn pulled out the chair next to him and patted the seat. “Come sit down,” he said. 

“_Why._”

“I have a question for all of you,” Reborn said, pleasantly. 

Slowly, curiously, Mammon drifted back, and lingered pointedly in the doorway. Taking the hint, Reborn slid the chair back into place. 

“What is it?” Verde said, writing slowing to a stop as he eyed Reborn speculatively. 

“I was wondering,” Reborn said, very nonchalantly. “How many of you believed Colonnello, exactly.”

“That wasn’t phrased like a question,” Fon said. 

Reborn blinked at him. _I don’t quite understand what you mean_, his face seemed to say. 

Verde rolled his eyes. “Absolutely _none _of us,” he said. “We’ve covered that already.”

“Would you be willing to bet on it?” Reborn said, challengingly. 

Silence. Lal half-expected Mammon to turn and leave, huffing at what a waste of their time this was. Curiously, they lingered, staring at Reborn, their expression indiscernible under their hood. 

“You want to ask us,” Verde said. “To _bet _on this. Like _juveniles_.” 

“None of us agree with Colonnello,” Fon said. “What would be the point?”

“Fun,” Reborn said. “An invaluable sense of superiority over your fellow men when you win. Money. Bragging rights. A sense of community. The opportunity to invest yourself in the sad absurdity that Colonnello’s life has become. A chance to drag yourself out of the mind-numbing routine of the day-to-day and reinvigorate your bored, tired soul. A distraction to avoid thinking about the company you’re forced to keep. Something to do to pass the time until you’re finally free and can escape the dull monotonous horror of—”

“Shut _up_,” Lal said, annoyed. 

Miracle of miracles, Reborn listened. 

“I assume you’re willing to bet on this, then?” Fon said. 

“I wouldn’t suggest it if I wasn’t,” Reborn said. 

Verde studied Reborn for a moment, then said, “I’ll do it.”

“Excellent,” Reborn said. He turned to Mammon. “You can record the bets and keep track of the money.”

“Hold on,” Verde objected, setting his notebook and pen down on the counter and crossing his arms over his chest. “How do we know Mammon will be honest?”

Mammon produced a pen and notebook out of their cloak, and flipped the notebook open. They didn’t look over at Verde. “You don’t have to join if you don’t trust me, of course,” Mammon said, coolly. “Though I find it a bit rich, coming from you.” 

Verde stiffened and opened his mouth, eyes flashing with a frigid, icy anger. 

“It sounds like it could be fun,” Fon said, quickly, before Verde could escalate the situation further. “I’ll join too. Lal?”

All eyes turned to her. Lal regretted not leaving sooner. She opened her mouth to say, _no, absolutely not_, but was interrupted by Reborn, who said, smoothly, “Oh, there’s no need to ask Lal. She won’t be joining.” Then, locking eyes with Lal, raising a challenging eyebrow, he said, “Lal doesn’t approve of ridiculous things like this, after all.”

And, the thing was, Lal _knew _he was baiting her. She wasn’t stupid. She knew it, she _did_.

So she should say, _yes, I do think this is ridiculous, and I won’t be part of it_. 

It was just so utterly reprehensible that Reborn was _speaking _for her, and so _authoritatively_ \- and a very large part of Lal seethed and balked at the horrifying notion of agreeing placidly with Reborn when he had so obviously thrown down a gauntlet. 

Lal breathed in, and bit down on the hooked worm. “I’m in,” she said, stiffly, refusing to drop Reborn’s gaze. 

The edges of Reborn’s lips curled into a satisfied smile. 

* * *

“So,” Mammon said. “For the sake of clarity, we’re betting on whether or not Colonnello’s right that Skull is hiding something. All bets, once made, are final and cannot be changed or altered in any way.” Their pen poised over their notebook, they stared around the silent room. “Who’s first?”

“Reborn.” Verde and Lal said, at the same time. 

“If you insist,” Reborn said. He leaned back in his chair and adopted a thoughtful expression. “I bet,” he said, after a moment. “That Colonnello is wrong. _But_,” he said, drawing the word out with an unnecessary flourish. “Not in the way you think he is.”

“How specific and not at all vague,” Lal said.

“Thank you,” Reborn said. 

“I agree with Lal,” Verde said, looking annoyed. “Elaborate.”

“Note that your wording is very important,” Mammon said, blandly. They tapped their pen against the page as they watched Reborn, feeling the edges of irritation creeping up on them. 

Reborn thought again, for a moment, then said, “Colonnello is right in thinking that someone in the Arcobaleno is hiding something, but he’s wrong about the person.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Verde said. “We’re _all _hiding something.”

“Sounds like the confession of a guilty conscience,” Reborn said, nonplussed, his beady little black eyes trained on Verde. “You have something to get off your chest?”

“No,” Lal said, sharply. “Verde is right. You’re still being too vague.”

“Alright,” Reborn said. “Fine. Here’s my bet: Colonnello is wrong, but not that one of the Arcobaleno is hiding something, just _who_ is. Skull isn’t hiding anything, Yuni is.” 

Silence descended on the room, and Reborn said, “Is that specific enough for you?”

“It’ll do,” Mammon said, and jotted down Reborn’s bet. “Verde, your turn.”

“_Elaborate_,” Verde said, staring Reborn down. 

“I think I was pretty clear,” Reborn said. 

Fon frowned. “You aren’t seriously accusing—”

“I’m not _accusing_,” Reborn said, scornfully. “It’s a bet. I never said it was anything _harmful_.” A brief pause, then, “And she’s done it before.”

That very efficiently put an end to the rest of the objections. Verde adjusted his glasses, then said, “Colonnello is wrong. Skull isn’t hiding anything, but he _is _baiting Colonnello into thinking he is.”

“What would be the _point _of that,” Lal said. 

“You expect me to know how Skull’s brain works?”

“I wouldn’t put it past you, no.”

Verde almost looked touched. It was revolting. 

Mammon recorded the bet, then said, very pointedly, “Lal?”

“Colonnello is wrong, Skull isn’t hiding anything,” Lal said. “That’s it. Fon?”

Fon tilted his head and thought for a moment. “For the sake of making things a little more interesting,” he said. “I’ll be the opposite.” He held up a hand to ward off Lal’s sharp look and said, “Colonnello is right, but whatever Skull’s hiding isn’t anything important or shocking.”

“Interesting,” Reborn said. “Mammon?”

Mammon tapped their pen against their notebook, then said, slowly, “Colonnello is both wrong and right. Skull isn’t _actively _hiding anything, but there is something he avoids bringing attention to.”

“Hm,” Reborn said, having the nerve to sound _disappointed_. “Nothing controversial to say? No wild theories?”

Mammon finished writing and closed their notebook with an air of finality. “No,” they sniffed. “All bets have been recorded and are final.” 

“Great,” Verde said. He turned, picked up his forgotten cup of coffee, said, “I need to go think about my life choices,” and left. 

Mammon resisted the childish urge to trip him on his way out. 

“This was interesting,” Fon said, far more diplomatically, rising from his chair and pushing it in. “But I think I’ll take my leave now, too.” He picked up his orange peels and dumped them in the trash, then wandered out. 

Reborn watched him go, then rose from his chair as well. Mammon watched him approach, then held out an arm across the doorway to halt him from leaving. They knew Reborn couldn’t see under their hood, but somehow his eyes still managed to uncannily meet theirs. 

“I never bet on anything I might lose,” Mammon said. 

Reborn held their gaze. “I surmised,” he said, simply. He tilted his head. “Do I seem like someone who gambles frivolously, then?”

“When it suits you,” Mammon said, just as simply. 

Reborn nodded, slowly, accepting that observation without offense, though he did seem a little amused. Bastard. “And do you think this is one of those times?”

“I think it’s very like you to play games.” Mammon arched an eyebrow, though they knew he couldn’t see it. “Incite chaos.” 

Reborn’s lips curled into a smile. “Do you want to bet on whether or not I’m serious about this?”

Mammon stared, consideringly, then let their arm drop. 

Reborn took that as the answer it was, and brushed past without another word. 

Mammon listened to his footsteps until they faded out of earshot. 

Lal stared at Mammon. “What was _that _about,” she said. 

Mammon doubted she heard much of their conversation. “Just making sure Reborn knew just how much money he was going to lose,” Mammon said, drifting across the kitchen to open the fridge. They paused. “What’s with all the _cake_.” Then, slightly horrified, “How much did this _cost_. _Why_.”

“Reborn,” Lal said, long-suffering. She didn’t need to say anything else. 

Mammon shook their head, tried very hard to not think about how much money had been wasted on this, then retrieved their strawberry milk from the depths of the fridge and sat on the counter to enjoy it in relative peace. 

A few minutes later, their peace was interrupted when Skull wandered into the kitchen, looking dazed, expression a concerning mix between bewilderment and terror. He set his mug next to the sink - along with the handle, which had broken off somehow - and then wandered out again, without acknowledging Lal or Mammon in any way. 

Lal and Mammon watched him go, then exchanged glances. 

Another few minutes ticked by, and Colonnello walked into the kitchen, hands stuffed into his pockets, looking like a surly teenager, caught half-way between confusion and annoyance as he was. He caught sight of the broken mug by the sink and winced. 

“Alright,” Lal said, looking as though she was preparing herself for the worst. “What did you do.”

Colonnello made a face, then scuffed at the floor awkwardly, looking somewhat embarrassed. Mammon could see Lal upgrading her estimation of the events from ‘terrible’ to ‘catastrophic’. 

“I told him I liked how his makeup looked,” Colonnello said, very quickly, very quietly. He seemed to be addressing the floor, and he _definitely _sounded like he wanted to be swallowed up by the ground. Then, hastily, without looking at or making eye-contact with anyone, he made his escape. 

The silence in the room stretched for a very, very long time. 

“Okay,” Mammon said, at last, feeling as though they had been swept abruptly off-balance. From the looks of things, Lal was no better. “What the _fuck_.”

4.54

After another day of testing out the compliment route, Colonnello was about ready to throw in the towel. Maybe it wasn’t something that worked for everyone. Maybe Skull was some sort of weirdo who didn’t like it when people complimented him, because if _anything_, the only thing complimenting him had _accomplished _was ensuring that Skull had become even more high-strung than usual. 

“He thinks you’re threatening him,” Reborn said, unconcernedly. 

“How do _you _know that?”

Reborn sniffed. “It’s obvious,” he said. 

“Obvious?” Colonnello said, incredulously. “I told him I liked his _socks_.How the _fuck _is that threatening?” 

“I don’t know how the minds of the lower echelon work,” Reborn said. “I just pick up the signals they give off.” 

“Wow, that’s helpful,” Colonnello said. 

“You don’t _need _help,” Reborn said, absolutely determined to be the biggest thorn in Colonnello’s side as possible. “You already _know _how to be nice.” 

“Fuck off, kora.” 

Reborn did not fuck off. Reborn tilted his head and said, instead, “Are you feeling hungry, Colonnello?”

Colonnello did not want to know. 

“No,” he said, and made a mental note not to step foot in the kitchen for the rest of the day. 

Reborn almost looked disappointed. 

(Later that night, Colonnello found a dictionary on his bed, flipped to the ‘n’ section, and with the definition of _nice _highlighted in bright yellow and circled rather pointedly with a pen. 

Colonnello dumped it in the trash and set it on fire.)

(He did read it, though. Just in case.)

4.63

Skull crept into the kitchen, eyes darting hesitantly over to where Reborn sat at the table. “Evening,” Reborn said, without looking up from the newspaper that Skull was about ninety percent sure he wasn’t even reading. 

“Evening,” Skull echoed, uncomfortably. He wondered how long Reborn had been sitting there. His eyes darted around the room, double-checking, just in case—

“Colonnello isn’t here,” Reborn said, calmly. He turned the page in the newspaper that he definitely wasn’t reading. “He said he wasn’t hungry.”

Skull breathed a sigh of relief, eyed Reborn warily, then slid over to the fridge and opened it. He frowned. “Ah, senpai?”

“Hm?” 

“Why is there so much cake in the fridge?” 

“Oh, that.” Reborn said. “Well, I just thought, since you enjoyed _my _cake so much, you might like to have some of your own.”

Skull licked his lips nervously, then said, shakily, “Oh, how nice of you. Uh, where’s my other food…?”

“You don’t need any other food. You have the cakes, which I have so graciously and kindly supplied for you.”

Skull paused. “Are you… joking?”

“Do I _look _like I’m joking, lackey?” Reborn said, sounding _bored_. “Check the cupboards.” 

Skull shuffled over, opened one, then gaped in horror. “Why did you get _so many_?”

“I thought, ‘surely if the lackey enjoyed and coveted my cake enough to _steal it from me_, he would certainly be overjoyed at having an endless supply at his disposal, with no need for thievery’.”

“_It was Colonnello’s idea_.”

“Oh, don’t worry. There’s plenty for him too.”

“..._Senpai_. I _don’t _like cake this much.”

“Well, maybe you should have thought of that beforehand,” Reborn replied, tartly. 

“How did you even _know_?”

Reborn scoffed. “You can’t hide anything from me.” A smile quirked at the corners of his lips. “Neither can Colonnello, for that matter.”

Skull eyed Reborn. “Good to know,” he said, inching out of the room. 

“Indeed,” Reborn said, airily. “Not going to eat anything, I see.”

“Not hungry,” Skull said. 

“Unfortunate,” Reborn said, completely unsympathetic to his plight. 

4.72

“Good morning, Skull,” Colonnello said, with forced cheer. Skull froze in the kitchen doorway, face quickly becoming alarmed as he spotted Reborn and Colonnello, both smiling at him. 

“Have some coffee, lackey,” Reborn said, sidling up next to Skull and forcing a coffee mug into his hand. Skull’s gaze dropped to the cup of coffee, then darted back up to Reborn. If his eyes got any wider, they were going to pop out of his head. 

“Come have a seat,” Colonnello said, patting the chair next to him invitingly. “Drink your coffee. Have some-” his eyebrow twitched, just slightly, “-_cake_. We can talk.”

Skull shuddered, and his mouth opened and closed a few times. “Look,” Skull settled on, at last. “I can put the last few weeks behind me, I swear. I understand the stalking, because, well, I _am _pretty great, we can all agree—and I can forget all about the two of you trying to murder me under the guise of ‘training’, and I won’t even _think _about all the… the _weird _threats, and I _definitely _won’t tell anyone about the whole fetish thing, I just—can you _please _stop?”

Reborn cocked his head to the side and leaned casually against the counter, a smile curling over his lips. “Fetish thing?” he asked. Colonnello could _hear _the delight in his voice, the bastard, and it was made worse with the knowledge that Reborn was letting his delight show on _purpose _to get to Colonnello - and it was _working_. 

“Wow!” Skull said, shrilly, reaching out to quickly set the untouched coffee down on the countertop and taking several hasty steps back. “Look at the time! I’ve gotta, uh, there’s something that, um, I just remembered I had this…”

Skull trailed off, made several vague gestures, then turned and bolted. 

“So,” Reborn said. “Fetish?”

“I’m going to murder you slowly,” Colonnello promised. 

* * *

Skull was fairly certain of one thing at this point: either Reborn and Colonnello were going to kill him in his sleep, or Skull was going to die of something vaguely suspicious and stress related, because _Reborn and Colonnello were going to kill him in his sleep and make it look like an accident_. 

Skull sat on his bed, staring at the wall opposite him grimly. “Oodako,” he said. “What could I have _possibly _done to deserve this.” 

Oodako patted his arm consolingly. 

Skull thought for a moment, then pulled out his phone and started scrolling through his contacts. After the last few weeks Skull had experienced, he had _more _than earned the right to complain viciously and loudly to anyone he wanted. He selected a number, then brought the phone up to his ear without a second glance. As the call was picked up, Skull said, as a way of greeting, “We’re driving each other so crazy that Reborn and Colonnello have resorted to drugs to cope.”

Skull refused to be at all charitable about the situation. What the _fuck _else was he supposed to think? 

A pause. 

“..._Lackey_,” Reborn’s familiar, unamused voice crackled through the phone speakers. 

Skull squawked, pulling the phone away from his ear and hastily slamming the _end call _button. 

“Well,” Skull said, after a long, horrified silence. “He was already going to kill me.” 

Silver lining.

After taking a moment to make peace with the no doubt brutal beat-down Reborn would likely bestow upon him later, he carefully went through his contacts again and double-checked that he had the right number before he hit call.

“..._Skull?_” Tsuna said as he picked up. 

“Is that you. Tsuna?” Skull asked, refusing to make the same mistake twice within the same minute. 

“_Um. Yeah?_” 

“Oh, great,” Skull said, falling onto his back and staring up at the ceiling. Oodako took that as an opportunity to pull himself up to rest on Skull’s chest, and Skull patted his head absently. “So, we’re driving each other so crazy that Reborn and Colonnello have resorted to drugs to cope.”

“_What?!_” Skull winced and pulled the phone away from his ear as Tsuna’s surprised shriek attempted to rob him of his hearing. “_What makes you say that?_”

Where did Skull even _start_. 

“Colonnello keeps trying to threaten me using _compliments_,” Skull said. “The other day, he told me I was good at gymnastics.” 

“_...That doesn’t sound too bad_.” 

“Yeah, sure,” Skull said. “Except he grabbed me by the shoulders, pulled me close, then _lifted me up so my feet were dangling off the ground_, and said-” and Skull deepened his voice into the truly terrifying growl Colonnello had used to deliver his horrifying message, “-‘_you’re good at gymnastics, you goddamn idiot. Do you understand me?_’.” And then he had shook Skull very pointedly until Skull nodded, his head bouncing up and down like a bobble-headed doll, at which point he finally dropped Skull, looking very satisfied, patted him on the shoulder, and wandered off. 

Silence. “_Ah_,” Tsuna said, at last. “_I see._” 

“And today,” Skull said, “Reborn offered me some of his _coffee_. He _never _lets me drink that. He doesn’t even let me _look _at it sometimes. _And_ they both keep _smiling _at me.” 

In the animal kingdom, baring your teeth was a sign of aggression. Skull was pretty sure that rule of thumb applied very heavily to Reborn and Colonnello too.

A long pause. “..._You didn’t drink the coffee, did you?_”

“Of course not!”

“_Right_.” Another long silence, then Tsuna said, rather hesitantly, “_Maybe they’re just… being nice?_” There was a slight stutter in Tsuna’s voice that indicated his disbelief. 

Just as well. This was the Arcobaleno - they didn’t do _nice_. 

Skull just had to figure out their _angle_. What did they _want_?

“Yeah, sure, that sounds just like them,” Skull said. “Tsuna, Reborn hasn’t even _tried _to hit me _once _in the last few days.” 

The muted, shocked silence on the other side of the phone was all Skull needed to know that he had finally made his point. 

Skull _knew _Tsuna would understand. They were brothers - not in blood, but bound together by something much much stronger: the act of suffering through the trials and tribulations that came hand in hand with having someone like Reborn in your life. 

“_Ah_,” Tsuna said, again, sounding stunned. 

“So what do I _do_?” Skull whined, because he was here to complain, and by _god _he was going to. “I can’t keep living like this - the other day I caught Colonnello snooping through my _underwear drawer_, Tsuna. And both he and Reborn keep popping out of _nowhere _and scaring the _shit _out of me. And! And! Reborn threw out all my food and replaced it with _tiramisu cake_, because he’s a _petty bastard_, and he’s _very heavily invested _in making me eat them. And _now _they’re both being _nice_, which is somehow _so much worse _than when they were just trying to beat me into the ground—and Colonnello _just _stopped stalking me and watching my every move, but I’m _pretty sure _he’s still convinced that I’m hiding_ something_, and he had this whole conspiracy board set up—Tsuna, he had a picture of my _parents_. Where did he get a picture of my parents? And now he and Reborn have decided to hunt down drugs that make them act weird and creepy and it’s seriously fucking with me, and I _really _think there’s something going on with everyone else, because Lal has been trying to corner me, too, and it’s _terrifying_—”

“_Um, holy shit,_” Tsuna said, sounding distracted. In the background, Skull could hear explosions. “_That’s, uh, a **lot**. Look, I’m sorry, I can’t really help you right now, I’ll call—**Gokudera no not the**—_”

The call disconnected mid-shriek. 

Skull stared at his phone despondently, then set it down and stared up at the ceiling. “This is _not _my month,” he said, unhappily. 

Where had it all gone so wrong? 

_Good luck_. 

Fucking _Byakuran_. 

_Nothing much_, he had apparently said to Colonnello. _Just something he thought might unsettle me_. 

Skull wondered if Byakuran felt satisfied with the chain of events he had tipped into motion. 

Fucking unlikeable bastard. He’d _better _be satisfied. 

Skull pursed his lips. He wondered _why_. 

He wondered what Byakuran knew. 

“No,” Skull said, mournfully, still staring up at the ceiling, very carefully not thinking about anything at all. “Definitely not my month.” 

4.81

Reborn put his phone away. “Skull thinks we’re on drugs,” he said, from where he was perched quite comfortably on Colonnello’s back. 

“I _wish_,” Colonnello said, his voice muffled from where his face was smushed against the floor. Then, “Get _off _me, you bastard, you’re _heavy_, kora!” 

“You must be mistaken,” Reborn said, settling himself where he was more securely. “I’m the perfect weight.”

“Perfect weight my _ass_—”

4.91

Lal knocked on Colonnello’s door frame to announce her presence, and raised an eyebrow at the way he jumped, looking up at her with what was _definitely _a poorly concealed guilty expression. A book lay open on his lap. 

“I wanted to ask you a question,” she said, by way of explanation as she came in and seated herself next to Colonnello on the bed. She took the opportunity to glance down at the book, then frowned, snatching the journal he was holding out of his hands and rifling through it. 

A picture fell out, fluttering down onto her lap. She picked it up, then tilted it towards the light to examine it better. A man and woman, arms around each other’s shoulders, grinned up at the camera. The man had Skull’s smile, Lal thought, and the woman had his eyes. Maybe his nose too, if she took a closer look. Lal could _certainly _see where Skull had gotten his propensity for purple, at the very least. 

“_Colonnello_,” Lal sighed. “Do _not _tell me these are Skull’s parents.”

“Alright,” Colonnello said. “I won’t tell you that, specifically.” 

“You were supposed to get _rid _of all this.” Lal flapped the journal about pointedly. “Not _downsize _it to a _journal_.”

“Well,” Colonnello started, but Lal tuned out his excuses as she flipped through the journal again, this time at a slower pace. 

Eventually, he seemed to realize she wasn’t paying any attention to him, and stopped, scooting closer to lean his head against her shoulder as she slowly made her way through Colonnello’s jotted down notes and observations.

> _Raised in the circus. This accounts for 1. His terrible personality 2. His skill with stunt work and acrobatics, and 3. His propensity for theatrics and performing _

Then, scribbled in the margins, underlined twice for some unfathomable reason:

> _4\. Clown makeup???_

She skipped ahead a few pages, skimming over what looked to be like a very concerningly thorough account of how Skull spent one of his days, dated around two weeks ago. 

> _Skull doesn’t shy away from talking about his life in the circus. Granted, he doesn’t bring it up often, but he doesn’t go to great lengths to hide it, either, and sometimes I can’t make him shut **up **about it. It certainly doesn’t seem to be a sensitive subject of any sort. The chances of the ‘something that happened before he met us’ having to do with life in the circus seems low, then. Not something to discard entirely, though. Improbable doesn’t mean impossible. _

Flipping further through the journal, she landed on:

> _Didn’t have any contact with or knowledge of the mafia and flames before he was contacted by Checkerface and met the rest of the Arcobaleno. Apparently, didn’t need any additional training or help with his flames when he joined up, despite his lack of prior knowledge. No one else thinks this is weird or contradictory at all, apparently. _

Scribbled very hastily and messily after, 

> _control nd lack of training needed fr flames cld be accounted for by age at whch skull first manifested flmes.. cld also accnt for nightmares? activtion of flames at yung age cn b traumatic... depnds on circmstnce? _
> 
> _wht circmstnce, & hw young??_

Lal’s lips twitched. “You’re missing a few letters here,” she said, circling a finger around the paragraph in question. Colonnello let out a groan, and slumped further against her side. His hair brushed against her neck, some strands tickling at her cheek. Lal did _not _adjust with him and curve her body to lean against his in turn, and she _certainly _didn’t tilt her head to rest her cheek more comfortably against the top of his head.

“Shut up, kora,” he muttered. “I was in a rush, so I skipped a few. It’s still _legible_, isn’t it?”

“Mm,” Lal said, trying to summon some of her earlier disapproval to disguise the fondness that was rising up inside her. She flicked past a few more pages. 

> _How does Byakuran even know what Skull is hiding? A holdover from the future-that-wasn’t? **What **does he know? _

Lal stopped. She slid the photograph of the young man and woman back into the journal, then snapped it shut. 

“Colonnello,” she said. 

“Oh, don’t start,” Colonnello said. “I get it, you don’t believe me, kora.”

“It’s not just…” She resisted the urge to put her face in her hands. “You never _said _you got this completely _inane _idea from _Byakuran_. What did he say to you?”

“Does it matter?” Colonnello sat up and ran a hand through his hair, knocking his headband askew. “Look, yeah, he might have brought the idea up to me at first, I’ll admit it. But it’s not like I _believed _him at first. I just… started noticing some things on my own, is all.”

Oh, so all Byakuran had done was give Colonnello a push. Yes, that was _very _reassuring. 

“Besides,” Colonnello continued. “You can’t tell me that it’s not a _little _bit suspicious that Skull didn’t need anything more than _perhaps _a brief rundown on flames when he met you guys. He was a civilian, and he didn’t need any training at all?” 

“Well,” Lal said, dryly. “He didn’t know how to shoot a gun, if that’s what you’re asking.” She tapped her fingers against the journal, then finally set it aside, turning to face Colonnello fully. “When we first met him, we _did _have to train him. Maybe not with his flames, yes, but that was more a relief than anything else. One less thing for us to have to do. And-” she jerked a thumb at the journal pointedly, “-you already have a probable explanation for it in here. Having his flames manifest from a young age would _certainly _have been encouragement enough for him to figure out what they could do and how to control them. You know just as well as me that he was chosen as one of the strongest for a _reason_, Colonnello.” Then, under her breath, “Even though it’s _very _hard to see, sometimes.” 

Colonnello flopped back onto the bed, glaring up at the ceiling. “There’s something _else_,” he insisted. “It might be big, it might be small - but there _is _something.”

“There aren’t shadows around every corner,” Lal said. “Sometimes a coincidence is just that. A coincidence.”

“I know,” Colonnello said, though he still had that stubborn set to his jaw. 

Lal sighed, then picked up and dropped the journal on Colonnello’s chest pointedly. “I’m not going to take this from you,” she said. “Because I don’t think that would stop you at this point. But I’m warning you, Colonnello. If this continues the way its been going, I’m going to lose my patience, and you are _not _going to like how I decide to deal with things then.”

One of Colonnello’s hands rose up to grip at the journal. “Alright,” he said. He sat up, slowly, then set the journal aside and grinned at Lal. “Let’s move on, though. You came in here to ask me something, right?” He looked about five seconds away from waggling his eyebrows at her obnoxiously. 

Lal was _not _blushing. 

“Head out of the gutter,” she snapped, automatically. “Absolutely not. _Nothing _along those lines.”

“I wasn’t implying anything,” Colonnello said, innocently, though the wide grin on his face belied his words. “Maybe you need to get _your _head out of the gutter, kora.”

Lal took great pleasure in very swiftly and forcefully pushing Colonnello off the bed. 

“_Ow_,” he complained, very pointedly, from where he laid sprawled on the floor. 

“Oh, don’t be a baby,” Lal said, dismissively. “You’re fine.”

Colonnello blinked up at her. “I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe you could try and kiss it b—”

He let out a pained wheeze as the heel of Lal’s boot ground into the delicate bones of his hand. 

“My question.” Lal said, ignoring the way Colonnello yanked his hand away and cradled it carefully, muttering curses under his breath. “I was wondering if you knew why Skull hasn’t been able to look me in the eyes lately.”

Colonnello tilted his head. “Uh,” he said, a little uncertainly. “No…?”

Lal raised an eyebrow at him, and Colonnello winced, slightly. “No,” he said, a great deal more confidently. “I don’t know why.” He shrugged. “He can be weird, though. Probably got some idea stuck in his head. I’m sure he’ll get over it, kora.”

“And you wouldn’t have _anything _to do with any ‘idea’ he might have, would you?”

Colonnello frowned, looking offended. “Hey, why are you accusing _me_? _I _don’t have anything to do with this.” 

Yeah, Lal believed that. 

“Guess I’ll just have to ask Skull then,” Lal said. Colonnello grimaced, ever so slightly. Lal resisted the urge to roll her eyes, said, “Put some ice on your hand, idiot,” and left the room. 

She’d find Skull later. As unfortunate as it was, right now, all she could think about now was Byakuran. The only chance he would have _had _to talk to Colonnello and plant this ridiculous idea in his head was at their last Arcobaleno meeting with Yuni, which brought up several questions Lal hadn’t fully considered before. 

Why _had _he been at their last meeting? What had Yuni said to explain it? 

Lal paused, and frowned. 

Yuni had never actually explained it, had she? 

_Here’s my bet: Colonnello is wrong, but not that one of the Arcobaleno is hiding something, just **who** is. Skull isn’t hiding anything, Yuni is._

Lal closed her eyes and pinched at the bridge of her nose, letting out a slight noise of frustration. She _hated _when it looked like Reborn was going to be right. God_damn _it. 

…It wouldn’t do to go jumping to conclusions, though. Sometimes a coincidence really was just a coincidence, after all. 

Still, it would be better to try and get this cleared up. 

Maybe it was time to give Yuni a call. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'i swear i won't tell anyone about your weird fetish' skull says, as if he hasn't already spilled it to fon. as though he isn't going to spill it to tsuna. as though he hasn't just brought it to reborn's attention. petty, thy name is...
> 
> anyway, this chapter is fresh off the press so please forgive any mistakes. i'll go through later & check for some, but if u see any and want to bring it to my attention, i certainly wouldn't be offended. 
> 
> also, alright guys, i promise that _one day_ i'll have super short, practically non-existent notes at the end, but i do feel like i need to explain some of my choices this chap, though, ofc, y'all can skip this if you want. bear w me please, its 11 am, i haven't slept, and it is genuinely a struggle to form thoughts. 
> 
> 1\. i'm really fond of the fanon backstory 4 skull where usually at some point in his life he joins the circus. i just took that one step further n decided that he was born n grew up there, too. did y'all know there's an act at the circus called the 'cloud swing'? i, for one, did _not_, and i'm not _saying_ that skull did that act at _least_ once, but i _do_ think it would be a waste of a perfectly good name if i didn't take advantage of it to make obligatory cloud jokes. im spreading this knowledge to y'all so that y'all can make obligatory cloud jokes n references too, if y'all want. share the love, spread the joy, etc. 
> 
> 2\. so, i kinda realized that there might be a slight theme in this fic w some of my jokes, n i wanted to say, just in case it was coming across this way, that i don't think colonnello is, like, stupid. as an example: the blockquoted section where there r a bunch of typos isn't meant to make colonnello look dumb, per se. it's meant to come off more as colonnello's brain working faster than his hand could write, so to keep up and not lose steam with his train of thought, he either has to a. have incredibly illegible messy chicken scratch handwriting or b. omit some letters while still keeping it legible and coherent enough to read. lal is familiar w that habit of his, which is why she has such a fond reaction to it. & while i don’t personally think that a typo ridden journal entry makes anyone dumb, that in combination w a few jokes i made earlier kinda make it look like a Theme, & i wanted to explain myself, lol. it's not reallyyy intended as a joke @ colonnello's expense, it's more like... me experimenting w characterization and making more excuses to have these two be soft w each other, bc yes, im love them. hopefully that makes sense, tho if it didn't come across that way at all, i might have to workshop that scene. lmk!
> 
> 3\. folks, alright. the scene w tsuna & skull gave me so trouble for one (1) specific reason: i really could not, for the life of me, remember how skull addressed colonnello & reborn when talking about them with other people, & i.... was _really_ not feeling up to scrolling feverishly though manga chapters in search of an answer, so i went back and forth for a while & then just defaulted to dropping the -senpai bc i figured this was something i could just fix later if it bothered anyone. so! once again lmk if it works or makes sense or if it just looks awkward. or, like, if you know the answer to my dilemma, haha. 
> 
> i... think that was everything i wanted to cover...? thanks for reading so far & if y'all have any questions i'd be happy to answer them to the best of my ability :) 
> 
> thank you so, so much for the kudos, comments, bookmarks, etc!!! y'all are the real mvps & cannot stress how much i love, appreciate, and cherish each one. thank you for reading, and i hope that y'all are staying safe and healthy, and that this chapter helped to entertain you in some way.


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